INTERVIEW-Swans not big culprit in spread of bird flu in EU
16 Feb 2006 15:10:41 GMT
By Anna Mudeva

AMSTERDAM, Feb 16 (Reuters) - Most of the European Union's known cases of bird flu have been in swans -- but they are not the species most guilty of spreading the deadly H5N1 virus around the continent, a leading scientist said on Thursday.

Dr Albert Osterhaus, a virologist at Erasmus Medical Centre in the Netherlands, told Reuters the pattern of the outbreaks of the disease in four EU countries in the last few days showed other infected wild birds were to blame.

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The researchers said their study confirmed the conventional wisdom that wild birds carry the relatively harmless viruses that eventually mutate into highly pathogenic avian influenza.

Scientists have suggested that migratory birds play an important role in the spread of the bird flu virus. H5N1, which originated in Asia, has killed over 90 people there as well as in Turkey and prompted culls of millions of chickens.

Osterhaus said cats were also vulnerable to bird flu and could catch the disease by eating infected wild birds.

"We know for sure that cats can get infected, dogs possibly too," he said, adding it was not clear whether other animals were at risk. [my emphasis]